Tour to Prince Albert and Eight Bells

I have just come back from a delightful tour for Seniors run by Tours-4-Us.  We were told that the average age of the bus-load of old people was 75, but as one of the passengers was only in her fifties, most of the others must have been over 80. They were, however, a very spry lot and also sweet and friendly..  It was nice being able to go with my friend, Cynthia. Apart from having to help her out of a bath on one occasion, her company was not demanding and we had fun together. The accommodation was good, unpretentious but comfortable and the food was good - too good. I ate far too much. We traveled through some spectacular scenery. Here are some photos.

 Du Toit's Kloof

 Matjesfontein

 Prince Albert Main Road

Ancient Tricycle

 Meiring's Poort

Hartenbos Train

Eight Bells

Education by Face Book

Just when I had decided that I should not waste my time with the daily reading Facebook, I start getting really interesting posts. Whether friends send them to me or whether it is the newspapers that are targeting me I don't know, but I have been receiving the most interesting articles. No only have I been able to keep up to date with what Zuma has been up to, but I have been exposed to some lovely poetry that I would not have otherwise been aware of and I have also learnt about new research findings in Biology and Neuroscience.
Today I came across an article published by the New Yorker about Schizophrenia( written by Siddhartha Mukerjee)  Genetic research has thrown new light on this disease and found a connection between immune response and Schizophrenia. A pair of genes (B2 and B4, I think they are called) are responsible for the production of proteins that destroy foreign matter, harmful compounds and junk of various kinds in the body. These proteins travel about scouring our organs including the brain and twine themselves around bits they want to destroy. They also twine them selves around some synapses. Apparently during early development, even before birth, our nerve cells are making more and more connections , but when we reach maturity many of these connections are destroyed by the aforementioned proteins, presumably because otherwise we would have far more than we need.  A variant of B4 causes too much synapse-destroying protein to be produced and synapses that are actually needed are destroyed. Somehow this gives rise to the symptoms of Schizophrenia. (and also bipolar conditions). Scientists think this is why the onset of psychotic episodes occurs typically in late adolescence or early adulthood when these proteins are active.

The brain is a very strange organ, more wonderful than we could ever imagine. It would be great if knowing more about the causes of mental illness could mean that a cure is in sight for this horrible illness, but I am afraid this is wishful thinking.

The decay of the ANC

So our infamous president is not going anywhere.  I am not surprised. Those who are greedy and unscrupulous can usually get what they want.The Guptas and their patron/puppet,Zuma have won. We shall have to get used to living under their evil and corrupt regime. Living under a bad government  is something we had to learn to do in the past. We can learn to do it again. We must get ready to face more poverty, more unemployment, higher prices, more government inefficiency. When I supported the struggle against the Apartheid government, I knew that this could happen. But at that time to join the forces opposed to the Nationalist Government was the right thing to do. It is no consolation to me to know that I foresaw the future so accurately.

This is a sad day for South Africa.

Atheists on Facebook

Some of my best friends are ... Isn't that what we say when we are about to be critical of some group or other. We throw a hypocritical sop to those who would say that we are too unkind or too picky or something of that sort. But thinking about it, it is actually true, that some of my best friends are atheists. This is hardly surprising as atheism is very trendy these days, especially among those who consider themselves intellectuals. The famous biologist and atheist, Richard Dawkins, is one of the most influential writers today. Perhaps not quite as popular as he was a few years ago, but still a best-selling writer. Whether it is his influence or not, proselytizing  atheists are popping up everywhere. It is  reading another Atheist rant on Facebook that has given rise to to what I am writing now.  What I would like to say to those who post such things on social media is this. "So you are an atheist. You don't believe in God. You are very pleased to have discarded all those restricting superstitions. Fine! I'm happy for you. But you don't have to dis the Faith of other people."

This is what I have against some Atheists: They are so radical in their attitude to religion.  Richard Dawkins in particular, is rabid in his opposition to all religion, but especially Islam. Any right-minded person must deplore the excesses of Islamic extremists, but the overwhelming majority of Moslems are not like that. Those I know personally are good decent people, dedicated to clean living and good works, which leads me to believe that Islam is actually a force for good in the world, although I do not subscribe to its tenets. But the Crusaders have nothing on Dawkins when it comes to hating those who believe differently.

Just a note on the above: The well-worn assertion that Religion has caused all the wars of the past      ( and the present too probably) is countered in  Karen Armstrong's Fields of Blood . She maintains that wars are all fought over land and that it is not religion but agriculture that is to blame. Personally I wonder whether most conflicts are not all about resources and that leaders of governments just cynically use religion to justify the bloodshed. The crusades were probably really about the Spice Trade and the modern ones are mostly about oil.

Colonials and Colonists

A new buzzword--  Decolonisation.  Actually this word is not at all new to me, It was very popular in Zambia in the sixties and seventies. It is always evoked when people want to change names of public buildings and streets. I approve of it in this context. We don't want to be reminded by signposts and maps of many of the rather awful people who have given their names to avenues and airports. Decolonising school and University curricula is also  justified. There is probably too much emphasis on European literature and African History should be taught far more from an African point of view than it is at present. But nowadays  colonist  colonialist   colonisation. have become dirty words. A lot of bad things have been perpetrated by colonists in the past, of course, but I am afraid very often anti-colonial is used to mean  not against being taken over and exploited by foreigners, but actually simply anti-white.

I have recently read the opinion that it is important to define what a colonist is. My dictionary simply defines a colonist as somebody living in a colony, which in turn is defined as a settlement abroad controlled by the founding country.How does a colony come to be and how does somebody become a colonist. A group of people might be sent out (as some of ancestors were sent to the island of St Helena) to establish a settlement which would be a colony of their mother country. The land might be uninhabited like St Helena was, or there might have been other people already living there, but it would be land that had not previously belonged to those who were colonising it. So you might define a colonist as someone who settles on land that did not previously belong to him. An appropriator of
land.in other words.

White settlers  in many cases, simply moved onto land in various parts of Africa, built houses and farmed land.. These certainly fulfill that  definition. There are also those who have acquired land through conquest. British people have been very successful in doing this. One can  also say that white people from the Western Cape colonised most of Transkei and the Eastern  Cape. I believe that  people who are now using the term, think of a colonist as a white person who has settled on land that did not belong to him(but probably to an innocent black person) However the definition above can also apply to Zulus who in the past acquired land through conquest, and what about the numbers of  people from the Eastern Cape who have settled on land in the Western parts of this country that never belonged to them. So if you are deriding colonists and colonisation (and in fact there is good reason for deploring the exploitation that has accompanied colonisation) you ought to refine the definition and say exactly which colonists you are talking about.

Fear of Poetry

Is there a word for this condition like claustrophobia - fear of small spaces. There should be. It appears to be widespread. In Evergreen and surrounds it is almost epidemic.   People who will discuss politics, philosophy and even literature come all over trembly when poetry is mentioned.
At this old age complex we have several clubs which hold regular meetings. The most well attended is the Knitting circle, but there are also Bridge groups and Canasta groups, a Book Club and a Photographic society. The Management, through the staff at reception, put up notices on a notice board and send out notices of the meetings of all these clubs,  All these, except the Poetry Club. For quite a long time there has been a regular poetry meeting on the third Wednesday of the month. Every month I remind staff at reception to publicize this. Every month they forget. Perhaps this is not deliberate, but a expression of a sort of subconscious fear.

There seems to be an of avoidance of poetry almost an hostility towards poetry that is very hard to understand. Here we have a very adequate in-house library which is in constant use. Not all of us watch TV all the time. There are  very many a readers and to judge by the books that have been donated by residents,  many readers who are knowledgeable and discriminating.when it comes to literature. Why then this resistance to poetry? Is it that they think poetry has nothing to say to them or that they  are afraid of what it might have to say to them? Or is it just a reaction to the boring way that poetry is taught in schools?

I have just completed an online course in Modern American Poetry(Modpo) and enjoyed it, so when I found that there were some short courses to fill in the time between the main course, I decided to try one of them. (a short course on John Ashbery's poems) After a few weeks of this course, I am beginning to understand the attitude of my fellow residents. Most of the poems in this course are quite obscure. I  enjoy reading them, for the imagery and the musicality, but have very little idea of what they are about. But the long involved discussions by fellow students are just too much for me to take. I am obviously not cut out for literary studies. Reading poems, even reading them a few times over to get the flavour of them better, which is what sometimes do in our sessions,, is great, but tearing them apart in order to write long screeds about them is just boring to me. As a poet I want my poems to be read and enjoyed, of course, but I don't think I fancy having them dissected.

What I enjoy is going to Poetry readings like Off the Wall, or the Poetry evening at Joon Cafe in Muizenberg, These provide a platform for those who write poetry. People come to read their poems and listen to the poems of others without discussion or judgement. Some poems are better than others, some are very good indeed, but everyone comes to read and to listen and simply to enjoy the evening. Those who find poetry threatening, should come to one of these events, I'm sure it would  change their minds.

Beginning of this New Year

For me this time, just after the holidays is like a hiatus, a time of  blank diary pages and silent telephones. Everyone has left Cape Town or so it seems to me. In fact to judge by the roads, everyone has come to Cape Town from  all over the country. But this influx of visitors only means that I stay at home rather than driving anywhere, because driving is so stressful. The other day we traveled to Fish Hoek so slowly that we were overtaken by a man walking next to a toddler on a tricycle.

During this very peaceful period, before the world wakes up and gets back to work again, I should be getting down to work myself and doing some serious writing. I have been somewhat discouraged lately, because I have not been very successful in getting work published, but I have just read a very inspiring article written by a writer with a similar problem. She complained to a more successful friend who gave the following advice. "Don't aim to get your work accepted. Aim to get 100 rejection slips" You  have to work very hard to do this, but you have a very good chance of succeeding and you also have definitely increased your chances of getting an acceptance.

Writers, particularly poets, should remember that we are not in this game for the money. No one makes a living out of writing verse. Neither are we in it for the glory and fame. I know dozens of poets living nearby, talented, gifted poets, but none of my other friends have heard of them.
So why do we write stories and compose poems? We write, just because we love to write.